Malian music star Habib Koité will perform this weekend at the Alliance Franco-Gambienne (AFG), located along Kairaba avenue. For the first time in the country’s musical history, the internationally-known Malian musician who sings and plays the guitar, Gambians will have the opportunity to witness this  big moment.

Habib Koité is known primarily for his unique approach to playing the guitar by tuning it on a pentatonic scale and playing on open strings as one would on a kamale n'goni. Other pieces of his music sound more like the blues or flamenco, which are two styles he learned under Khalilou Traore.

In contrast with other well-known Malian musicians such as Salif Keita and Oumou Sangaré, Koité's vocal style is intimate and relaxed, emphasizing calm, moody singing rather than operatic technical prowess. Members of Bamada play harmonica, violin, calabasa, and kora. Koité composes and arranges all songs, singing in English, French, and Bambara.

Koité was born in 1958 to musical parents, whom he learned instrumentation from by watching and listening. He joined the Bamako National Institute of Arts and became a conductor in 1978 after only six months of playing. He graduated in 1982, and formed his band Bamada in 1988.

The name "Bamada" is a nickname for residents of Mali's capital city Bamako, and the word roughly translates as "In the mouth of the crocodile." Other members of the band were friends of Koité's from childhood. Certainly, the Saturday musical rendez-vous will live up to expectations…